By BASHIR ADIGUN (AP) – Thursday, May 6th, 2010

ABUJA, Nigeria — Goodluck Jonathan was sworn in Thursday as the president of Nigeria, Africa's most populous nation, just hours after the death of the oil-rich country's elected leader whose long illness had sparked a leadership crisis.

Jonathan put on a sash bearing the green, yellow and white colors of Nigeria just after 9 a.m. (0800 GMT), signifying he had formally taken over for President Umaru Yar'Adua.

Yar'Adua, who long had suffered from kidney ailments and was recently hospitalized in Saudi Arabia because of heart inflammation, died at 9 p.m. Wednesday after apparently succumbing to his ill health.

By JON GAMBRELL
Associated Press Writer

LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) -- Nigerian President Umaru Yar'Adua, whose election marked the country's first peaceful transition of power from one civilian to another, has died following a debilitating illness that sparked a leadership crisis in Africa's most populous country. He was 58.

Yar'Adua's death Wednesday comes almost three months after his vice president assumed control of Nigeria and less than a year away from the next presidential elections in a nation once plagued by military coups.

Spokesman Olusegun Adeniyi said Yar'Adua died at the Aso Rock presidential villa with his wife Turai at his side. Adeniyi and other officials did not give a cause of death.

Yar'Adua had a long history of kidney ailments and recently suffered from an inflamed heart.

Yar'Adua will be buried before sundown Thursday afternoon in his home state of Katsina in accordance with his Muslim faith, said Ima Niboro, a spokesman for Goodluck Jonathan, the country's acting president.

"Nigeria has lost the jewel on its crown and even the heavens mourn with our nation tonight," Jonathan said in a statement. Jonathan added that the country should stay home from work Thursday as part of seven days of mourning for Yar'Adua.